


Sand

by caricari



Series: Summer Omens [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 6000 Years of Slow Burn (Good Omens), All set in the same timeline, Angst, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Ficlet Collection, Fluff, Historical, M/M, Pining, Smut, Snake Crowley (Good Omens), Summer, Summer Omens (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-24
Updated: 2020-09-24
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:53:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26632420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caricari/pseuds/caricari
Summary: 'Walking closer, he finds the demon spread out like some caricature of a prehistoric monster - something from before humanity had a name. His serpent form is long and smooth. Narrow columns of muscle mark out his spine. Small scales, his length. Watching, from a few feet away, Aziraphale feels the urge to run a hand down the length of him and feel the heft of life, beneath.'
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: Summer Omens [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1962562
Comments: 20
Kudos: 132





	Sand

**Author's Note:**

> Written for asparkofgoodness's [Summer Omens prompts challenge](https://thetunewillcome.tumblr.com/post/623395804680470528/here-we-go-friends-now-ive-never-been-the), (which, I am aware, happened about four centuries ago, now, but i've only just got around to editing them). All works are set in the same timeline, written/drawn in under an hour, and less than 5k. 
> 
> My ability to use grammar is wildly inconsistent. Please proceed at your own risk.

_2022, South Downs_

.

The day is hot and still. The sky overhead is full of haze. All along the Southern coast of England, life has ground to a halt. People have bunked off work in their droves - decanted from office blocks to sit in their gardens, feet in paddling pools, beers in hand - or fled to the beach, to escape the oppressive heat. The parks are full. The roads are empty.

In a small cottage, about a mile from the coast, an angel had broken from his morning’s translations at half past one, his corporation craving a drink of water and the removal of his waistcoat. Standing at the kitchen counter, he looks out across a sun parched garden and wonders vaguely where the other occupant of the cottage has taken himself off to.

He has not seen Crowley since seven o’ clock, that morning. While not uncommon for the pair of them to spend hours apart, a clear day usually means that the demon can be found in the garden - long fingers threading through the soil, searching for weeds amongst his carefully tended plants. On his knees, in the dirt, Crowley always seems supremely unbothered by the heat.

He is a creature built for heat, Aziraphale thinks. The demon’s body is lean and spare. He suffers through the long months of winter by curling up under blankets and napping by the fire. In the depths of December, he will often seek Aziraphale out, in his story - tempt him back to bed in the middle of the afternoon.

“It’s fucking freezing,” he’ll say, lips curling into a smirk. “Come warm me up.”

And Aziraphale does. Always.

The ability to offer comfort to one another, to touch and share, is still a novelty - more than a year into their post-armageddon freedom. The heady power of 'being allowed’ is enough to turn the angel from even the most engrossing book. So, in the winter, when Crowley seeks him out, the angel always responds. In the summer, however, it is often Aziraphale who seeks.

Rinsing his water glass, he places it upside down on the draining board and sets off to search the house. He scans the kitchen for clues, first, checking that his partner’s car keys are sitting in their usual position on the kitchen counter, alongside Crowley’s many labour-saving appliances. They are. The demon has not popped off anywhere, then. He must be nearby.

Aziraphale checks the bedroom next, where the only sign of inhabitance is a discarded black sock. Then, he looks to the large room at the end of the cottage, where Crowley can sometimes be found spread out over the overstuffed sofa, watching reality television on an indulgently large screen.

No sign.

The garden is next on Aziraphale’s checklist. He looks in the shadows of the shrubbery, and in the small orchard at the end of the lawn, but finds Crowley in neither location. The demon’s sunbaked flower beds are colourful and freshly watered. A trowel and small bag of compost sit out, near the shed - recent activity, but no sign of his friend.

Sighing, the angel turns his eyes to the end of the lawn, where a narrow deer path leads down, through a gap in the hedge, towards the sea.

This is one of the greatest selling points of their new home. It lies within walking distance of ocean waves and open skies. It had been what attracted Crowley, in the first place. Aziraphale had been willing to find somewhere further inland, with more modern amenities (thinking that would please his friend), but the demon had brought them here, instead - to a tumbledown cottage on a rocky outcrop of land near Chichester.

Here, the soil is poor and the demon can stoke envy in the neighbours, by producing the most verdant garden for miles around. Here, the morning air is filled with the noise of wind and gulls, and the weather is wild. The journey up to London can be accomplished in a few hours in the Bentley, (or in an instant, with a snap of the fingers, if they are in a hurry), and the building is historically unimportant - meaning they can tinker with the internal proportions to their hearts’ content.

They have made a home, here, over the last dozen months. Aziraphale still has the bookshop, in Soho. Crowley still has his flat. (Though it is now located over the bookshop, where the angel’s unused one-bed used to reside). They still have lives, in the city, but this cottage serves as a base. It is where they spend most weekends, blissed out in one another’s company. Curled on the sofa, in the winters. Spread out in the garden, in the summer. Together.

The little path, to the sea, is one of Crowley’s favourite features. The demon has always liked the open space of a coast. Aziraphale can remember the Crowley of the early years - the Crowley of Tyre, and Byblos, and Carthage - eyes saffron bright against blue waves. The demon had been perfectly at home, in those cities. He had thrived in the busy ports and markets, leaving chaos in his wake. He had seemed at peace, in the foothills outside them, over looking the sea.

Aziraphale remembers the arguments and truces of those early years - the tensions and longing. He remembers how beautiful Crowley had always been, how clever and brilliant, and unassumingly kind. Aziraphale had loved the demon, even then.

It is love that leads him along the mile long path, now, making his way through scrubland towards the coast. The land falls away into the water, here. There are narrow passages, where one can pick their way down, from the hills, to the sand, if you are careful - and Aziraphale is. His feet are angelically sure on the uneven terrain, eyes fixed on the pale strip of ground between the chalky cliffs and the blue waves. At first, he cannot spot Crowley, amidst it all. There appears to be only sand, stretching on, until the next jutting cliff. Then, he identifies a few dark shapes; a pair of shoes, some half folded jeans, a rumpled t-shirt.

Walking closer, he finds the demon spread out like some caricature of a prehistoric monster - something from before humanity had a name. His serpent form is long and smooth. Narrow columns of muscle mark out his spine. Small scales, his length. Watching, from a few feet away, Aziraphale feels the urge to run a hand down the length of him and feel the heft of life, beneath.

He clears his throat first, though, to announce his presence.

It does not do, to startle a snake from slumber. Even a familiar one.

“My dear?”

The serpent of Eden unwinds like liquid beneath the shifting layer of sand. He is buried up to his sides, beside his discarded clothes. He has no need of them in this shape, Aziraphale thinks - or, indeed, in any other. The beach around them is deserted. It will be deserted for miles. Their magic keeps this place well hidden. It is their own personal Eden. A safe space, where they can finally learn to live, after six thousand years of existence.

The angel moves closer, squats down until he is balanced over his heels, hands on his knees.

“Hello, Crowley.”

_Angel._

The snake demon tilts his head back. Breathes Aziraphale's name. He cannot speak, in this shape, but he does not need to. There are deeper ways of communication - ways that leave the echo of his voice in the resonance of the angel's heartbeat, that write his intention into the shape of his bones. He and Crowley know one another in ways that no other living soul has experienced, Aziraphale thinks. They are something new, together. Something beautiful.

He brushes two fingers over the snake demon’s slightly upturned snout.

“Thought I’d come see what mischief you were getting up to,” he murmurs, as his friend uncoils, black giving way to red, body turning over on itself. Bunching up. Preparing to change. “But it appears I’ve caught you rather off the clock…”

_Well, naturally…_

Crowley stretches. And then, he shifts.

It creates a strange, metaphysical sensation in the air around them. Reality squeezes. Matter rearranges itself. Angels and demons cannot create or destroy energy, but they can twist it, to suit their needs. It is a skill that Crowley, in particular, excels at. He can stretch into a human form as easily as Aziraphale stretches his fingers, after a long afternoon of writing. Breathing in as a snake, he breathes out as a man. And the angel gives a small noise of approval as he flops back against the sand, rearranging long, familiar limbs.

“…It’s too hot for mischief,” Crowley finishes his earlier sentiment, the tiniest hint of the sibilant still clinging to his consonants.

Aziraphale smiles.

“It is, a little.” His eyes pass over his friend’s forehead and cheeks, burnished with freckles from his days in the garden. “The newscaster, this morning, said it would hit thirty nine degrees, by three o’ clock.”

“Celcius?”

“Well, naturally, dear boy. We’re not heathens…”

“Speak for yourself,” Crowley yawns.

Aziraphale smiles indulgently and rearranges, sitting down in the sand beside his friend. The demon stares up at him, drowsy and content, unabashed by his own nudity.

“You’ll give some fisherman quite a surprise, one of these days,” the angel murmurs, laying two fingers against the bridge of Crowley's nose - the equivalent position to where he had traced his friend’s snout, minutes before.

“M’hoping for a feature in Sea Snakes Monthly.”

The angel grins.

“Ah yes. The rare red bellied beach serpent, of the southern coast,” he fabricates, amicably. “Not spotted in these parts for nearly four centuries.”

“This snake enjoys basking on the tideline,” his friend hisses back, “and long slithers along the beach.”

“Unfortunately, we were unable to inspect this specimen more closely because, upon coming ashore, our photographer was confronted by a nude, angry landowner and chased back into the sea.”

“The snake remains the most impressive documented, to date.”

Aziraphale allows himself a gratuitous eye sweep of his best friend’s naked, lanky form.

“Oh, you do think rather a lot of yourself, don’t you?” 

“Oi!”

The latent strength of them, even encased in Earthly bodies, is phenomenal. Crowley can deploy all of his against Aziraphale, pulling him down into the sand, and the angel can let him with complete confidence. He can even twist the demon over and pin him down, in turn - grinning as the serpent nips at his neck and tastes his skin.

They are not evenly matched - Aziraphale is the stronger of the two, by a good margin - but they can be more free with one another than they could ever allow, with humans, and that is an enormous novelty. It is still a rush, to be able to let go. Every time.

“You are so cruel…” Crowley grumbles, squirming underneath him.

He is not trying very hard to free himself.

Aziraphale has made sure that his grip is only just enough to make the sensation pleasurable (a challenge, meant to be overcome, rather than a marker of his full strength). They only deploy his full strength very occasionally, and after explicit discussion. Both of them have hangups about that sort of control and vulnerability. Aziraphale, in particular, is only just reaching a point where he feels comfortable in exploring it.

Today, their sparring is only playful.

Crowley hooks a leg around his side.

“Horrid…”

“You are getting sand everywhere,” the angel chides, but the laughter in his voice gives him away. There is not a single ounce of him that wants Crowley to stop. He loves this, loves them being playful, together - his friend’s fingertips tugging irreverently at his shirt, at his waistband. “You’ll be finding it in your crevices, for days.”

"Well, luckily, I have you to check my crevices." 

“Hmm.”

“Nngh.” Crowley presses a kiss into the side of Aziraphale’s neck and then flops back, against the sand. “Did you finish your book, then? I looked in on you, before I left, but you were up to your eyeballs in Latin.”

“Greek, actually. I was translating,” Aziraphale explains, propping himself up on one elbow, beside the demon, leaving his arm around Crowley’s waist and smiling as his friend’s foot works its way between his legs with a gentle possessiveness. “But yes, I’m finished for the day.”

“Fancy a dip?”

Crowley pops the 'p', motioning towards the sea where the tide is still drawing out, the waves gentle and inviting.

“Oh, I don’t know…” Aziraphale's eyes follow the nod, admiring the admittedly tempting scene. “I didn’t bring anything to wear and I hate miracling clothes out of nothing. They never feel quite right.” He rolls his eyes as the demon’s lips part, hastening to cut off his friend’s inevitable response. “We don’t all cavort around the place in the nude. Really. Some of us have standards!”

“Cavorting? I’m on my back!” The demon exclaims, then gives an experimental little wriggle against him. His hard side is pressed into Aziraphale’s hand, soft belly against Aziraphale’s hip. He is delightfully warm.

“And yet you manage to cavort, nonetheless.”

“Hah!”

The angel spreads his fingers, letting them fall into the shallows between his friend’s ribs.

They do have so many ribs, he thinks, warm under the weight of Crowley’s gaze. Humans have twenty four. Snakes have more - pairs and pairs and pairs of them - a cage of sprung bone, curled around around their tender parts. He wonders if Crowley has a human number, or more, within his outwardly human shape. He wonders if his friend has ribs to spare.

Humanity used to believe that Eve was made from one of Adam’s ribs, Aziraphale thinks, vaguely. He wonders if they could have the same regenerative power. If his corporation were damaged, could they could reform it from one of the demon’s slender bones? Could they make something entirely new, together? Another human-shaped vessel, to hold some mixed, ineffable part of their souls? A new spark of life?

Aziraphale thinks that they might give it a go, one day. Crowley had brought the subject up, last month, unprompted - implying that he’d already given the subject a great deal of thought. The angel had been surprised, at first, but strangely pleased. Being part of a larger family was something he had never considered a possibility, for himself, but he thinks he might like it, one day - when he and Crowley have had a bit of time to get comfortable in themselves. It might be nice to have backup. More of their side. More to love.

They’ve put a pin in the idea, for now, but he expects they’ll revisit it eventually. They do have a lot of time on their hands, after all.

“Oh, you are-,” he leans in, feeling a little overwhelmed by the possibilities that lie ahead of them. “So very beautiful.”

“Ngh-, don’t try and distract me!” the demon grumbles, pushing sharp fingertips into his side. “Come on, angel. Swimming Nice cool waves…”

“Well, it is rather hot,” Aziraphale concedes, tilting his head in to rest a cheek against a brow. He is feeling his resolution slide, feeling his need to be proper yielding to temptation. “Oh, okay. Perhaps-,”

The words are no sooner out his mouth than Crowley has dug his fingers in. There is a snap, and a rush of magic, and the two of them are twisting through the air. In an instant, the angel finds himself free of his clothes and being dumped, unceremoniously, into the icy waves of the Atlantic.

Water rushes over his head, loud in his ears, and he hears Crowley nearby - giving a delighted bark of laughter. Then, his feet are hitting the bottom and he’s scrabbling up. Head breaking the surface.

“Crowley!”

He slips, falls over, finds a hand in his, pulling him back upright. As he breaks the surface, he finds Crowley spluttering with mirth.

“You fiend!” He yelps, skin on fire with the sudden contrast of temperature - but his surprise does not give way to anger. It finds laughter, instead. “You absolute… horror!”

He is incoherent, chuckling like a fool as Crowley throws himself forwards, knocking them both down into the surf. And they are both laughing - coughing and splashing - Aziraphale trying to make for the shore while the demon tries to reel him back out. And the air is full of their joy.

It is juvenile and simple, and indescribably wonderful.

After a minute or so, the angel stops trying to flee and turns to face his friend instead. Crowley pulls him in, giving a guttural noise of delight as Aziraphale lets himself be lifted - the water doing the most of the work - wrapping his legs around his best friend’s waist. Their bellies, pushedtogether, are the only warm points in the cold water. And Aziraphale can feel his friend’s heartbeat thundering away, beneath his ribs. He can feel Crowley's nipples, hard, against his own chest. He can hear both their ragged breaths, as they lean in and share a kiss. They are so alive, he thinks, grinning wider. So alive.

“Horrid demon…”

His friend gives a deep rumble of laughter and kisses him harder.

“It’s fucking freezing. Take me home and warm me up?”

And Aziraphale does. Always.

.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me lurking on [IG](https://www.instagram.com/heycaricari/), [Twitter](https://twitter.com/heycaricari), and [Tumblr](https://heycaricari.tumblr.com/) @heycaricari


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